


Wolf like me

by TuskFM



Series: When the moon is round and full [1]
Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Creatures & Monsters, Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Implied/Referenced Torture, Werewolf Bucky Barnes, Werewolves
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-29
Updated: 2019-10-29
Packaged: 2021-01-07 23:29:44
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,331
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21226031
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TuskFM/pseuds/TuskFM
Summary: "He's just about to open his eyes when he feels it, a sudden shift in the room’s air, a faint warmth coming from a corner. Before he knows it the muscles in his back and legs coil, and he takes in one deep breath before tearing through his clothes into the wolf form and jump straight to the neck of the figure standing in the corner in one smooth motion."The White Wolf is Hydra favorite asset. It was called numerous names, the Winter Solider, a ghost story. It’s sent to another mission, far from being the last one; not that it could ever know this fact.





	Wolf like me

**Author's Note:**

> Contains canon typical violence and trauma. Bucky is with Hydra, so the usual manipulation and abuse that come with this kind of work but it’s not extensive or graphic.
> 
> “A man with a club was a lawgiver, a master to be obeyed, though not necessarily conciliated.” Jack London, The Call of the Wild

Yakov wakes in his assigned room with a startle and a quick breath, nothing more. He does not open his eyes; he does not rise. He lays still, as still as a dormant body can be, taking in his surroundings. He lets the cold of the room run down his bare arms, concentrate on the rough feeling of the only cover on his cot under his palms and neck. His Instinct is screaming inside him, telling him something is not right. He isn’t sure if it’s his training or beast instincts, but either way he lies very still, careful to not change his breathing pattern, to not open his eyes.

He recognizes the room as the one he currently occupies in Hydra’s Siberian facility, the faint electrical noise from the line running down the corridor, and the water dripping, drop by drop in that leaking pipe in the north wall, with the same two second and a half interval as always. He can feel the sole of his shoes and the little bump under his pillow from the stone he keeps there. Technically, he’s no allowed to carry weapon outside of the authorized training zones, as he’s not a standard soldier, but he’ll be dead and damned before he’s caught without a weapon near him.

He's just about to open his eyes when he feels it, a sudden shift in the room’s air, a faint warmth coming from a corner. Before he knows it the muscles in his back and legs coil, and he takes in one deep breath before tearing through his clothes into the wolf form and jump straight to the neck of the figure standing in the corner in one smooth motion. He’s about to sink his teeth into the warm flesh pulsing under his maw when he realizes the figure’s smell belong to his handler. He barely has time to let go of him before he feels the teaser in Karpov’s hand starts to crackle. He shifts back to his human form just in time to escape the burn of electricity through his body. Yakov catch his now ragged pants and manage to secure the fly shut before he steps away and sharply stand at attention.

“_Sir._” He gives a curt nod, trying to look as docile as possible.

“_At ease Soldier._” Karpov barks as he push himself off the ground and tuck the teaser away in his belt, not once leaving Yakov out of his sight. Yakov cross his hands behind his back and look at his handler. He's in parade gear, which can only mean that Yakov is going to be shown around. “_Next time you try to maul me will be the last._” He tells him with a leveled voice, but Yakov can smell the stark and bitter odor of fear in the room that suddenly spiked. He wants to tell him that the training he was given made him like that, and if he wishes to not be killed, he shouldn’t induce a situation where Yakov’s Instinct is triggered, but he is his superior. And as such, he owes him respect, so he keeps his mouth shut and eyes fixed straight ahead.

“_You have a mission Soldier, be in the briefing room in five minutes._” Karpov tells him.

“_Mission parameters, Sir?_” He asks.

“_You’ll get them in time, along with your weapons and team._” Yakov stands at attention once again, hearing the unsaid _shut up and do as I say_, and Karpov turns around, walk away through the heavy metal door that seals the room.

Yakov waste no time in getting ready. He changes out of the thin pants he’s issued with when he’s out of training to a pair of tactical pants and put on the regulated long sleeve shirt and Kevlar jacket. If Karpov wanted his best attire, he would’ve said so, so Yakov will only go for the barest minimum. He doesn’t change his shoes, since he’ll receive his gear later there’s no need to waste time with that.

Because he sure doesn’t want to waste his time anymore. He's been in the base for a bit more than a week, from what he gathered there’s a situation that needed to wait for the best window to act on and it appears it finally has come. He was occupied with training new recruits, teaching them how to fight against unnatural beings, but if anything, it’s a waste of his skillset. He knows it, the agents present knew it, his handler knew it too. But Hydra is order, and order comes through knowing one’s place in the chain of command. So, he said nothing and did as he was told. That doesn’t mean he was particularly happy doing it, but what he feels matters not.

He’s an asset, in the same way as anyone in the facility. Just because he’s worth more than them doesn’t mean he’s above obeying orders.

As he walks out of the room, he can feel the distant pulls of the moon beat inside his chest, stronger than it was for the past week. He knows the full moon is coming, he senses it. As old and powerful this kind of magic is, lycanthropy is still a curse, and the power is taken directly for the moon. The more powerful the moon is, the more incontrollable the magic is. For about three days before the gibbous, he gets restless, angry, irrational, hungry for anything, and his wolf form is more ruthless, rabid. The full moon is the worst of all, he loses all control and can shift back and forth without any kind of control or morals applied to the wolf state, while the next few days are spent in exhausted irritation before all is back to normal. The new moon, where the power of the moon is at its lowest is when he feels the most human, and also the weakest.

Of course, Hydra tried to help him with those moon phases. At least, from what he remembers, they tried to train him to control himself during the full moons, to let him keep his power for the new moons. He tends to not remember the past, another curse of lycanthropy. But it matters not, because he knows there’s orders he can follow, that’ll guide him to what he ought to do.

He’s about four meters from the briefing room door when his enhanced hearing catch snippets of voices. One is Karpov’s, the two others are Americans, males in their forties, while the fourth one is female, with a thick eastern accent. The four of them are speaking in English, certainly to accommodate the two Americans.

“-you sure about this, Karpov?” One of the males ask.

“It is the best one we have.” Comes his stern voice.

“I mean, he is a werewolf.” The male asks again.

“And one of the most useful, most perfect of all Hydra’s assets.” Karpov interrupts him.

“I have seen the tapes. The Winter Soldier is our chance.” The female argues, and that seems to quiet down the protestations. Yakov, while not sorry for eaves dropping and gaining intel, does feels bad for disobeying a direct order so he speed up his step to enter the room. He comes to stand at attention at about two meters from Karpov and acknowledge him and only him in the room, the only ranking military there and the one he must take his orders from. Unless he’s specifically asked to, he won’t bother to interact with the three others present in the room.

“Sir.” He salutes Karpov in English to follow the language used right now.

“Soldier.” The colonel turns toward him. “At ease.” Yakov cross his hand behind his back while carefully maintaining a neutral face. He can feel the eyes of the others present on him, and if he doesn’t remember if he’s already met them, his Instinct is telling him they’re new people, and to not be trusted. But then again, his Instinct tells him to trust very few persons.

“How is he supposed to help us?” One of the men says.

“Will you just stop it.” The second one hisses at him. Yakov takes a deep breath and let the smells in the room wash over him. Karpov’s metallic, acrid scent is a familiar one, human in every sense that his heart isn’t. The female has a hint of elves’ blood, but faint enough to be only in a long-removed family member and not of importance. The one male that keeps arguing is purely human while the other reeks like a vampire. That dead, ash-tasting smell that itch and makes his hair dress over his arms. Yakov wants to growl; show his teeth and make them both disappear. He doesn’t though.

“You will go in Romania and defend our interests there.” Karpov tells him, and Yakov directs his attention back to him. He hands him a file filled with photography which he dutifully opens.

“Our support in Romania is endangered by new political views. Your mission is to go there and eliminate the targets.” The pictures inside the file are of a congress of vampire, planning to take the power in country, and thus compromising the ties of Hydra there, and their influence. Yakov silently reads through each small biography containing their activity, place and ranks. Most of them are young vampire, not above a century, willing to change things and do it by force if needed. But in that assembly, three of them are older vampire, born in the early 18th to the 15th and those are harder to kill. Past the hundred years they start to amass power, thus becoming more and more powerful.

From what Yakov is gathering in this file, they are to meet during an under the radar event, tomorrow night. It is a private building, own by one of the vampires, but the security will be from a public, human company along with a couple of vampire and faery that still lives in the country. Romania has a long history of vampire blood line, so most of the other unnatural beings left it to go to a more open place.

“What is he going to do?” The human male mumbles, and Yakov wants to bash his head in. Is he faithful to Hydra or not? Does he doubt them? He almost glare at him before he pulls himself together and look up at Karpov.

“You will go at night, with a small team, no witness, casualty allowed. Agent Ciobanu here will be your handling agent for the duration of the mission. She’ll give you the intel needed and the team you require.”

“Yes Sir.” Yakov flips through the file and piece together all the information at hand to form his plan. “Accident, planned execution or hate crime?” He asks.

“Planned execution. There’s a small group of extremists in Romania protesting for the end of vampire’s power there. Mr. Wright has planned everything to accuse them.” Karpov hands him another file, this time with the detail of that group and what cues are at his disposition.

He senses gazes on himself but brush it off quickly, instead assessing the intel and which way would be the best to accomplish that mission. He takes his time, running the ideas and deciding on the best teams, best weapons and strategic planning to go for. He has the luxury here to do that, and the more well planned the operation is, the less likely it’ll blow up on them and the less likely it’ll be needed for him to wipe everyone in the building. A clean scene is always in their benefits.

“Two small teams,” He says as he closes the file and hands it back to Karpov. “One to take care of the guards outside, some tranq darts should do for the fairies and humans, usual garlic solution and silver to kill the vampires. Killing can be avoided with the rest since they’re not in the congregation but merely guarding them. They don’t know anything of value against us and will benefit to the vampire execution cover up.

“The second team will infiltrate the building, three agents undercover by the front door, playing the lost civilian on vacation who cannot speak Romanian. Four agents for the back doors, covered by a vanishing charm, in team of two, one takes the north wing the other the south wing, make their way up to the penthouse where the meeting takes place. I will tag along the north wing team; they will deal with the most vampire.

“Once the two tactical team reunite with the undercover one, we will get into the main room. Get me one magic practitioner on the team and he will get rid of the spells protecting the place. If we manage to keep it stealthy and have the element of surprise, I can eliminate the ancient ones on my own. If we are spotted before, the brute force shall be used. I need a team experienced in fighting vampires, correctly equipped.” He turns towards Agent Ciobanu for the last part, assessing her with a long glance.

“We have plenty of experience in vampires in Romania.” She says, voice thick by her accent but assured. She’s dressed in field gear, thick combat rangers with reinforced Kevlar jacket and a holster on her thigh. Yakov can sense some magic on her as well as belladonna. She’s done her researches and is distrustful of him. He's glad she’s the handling agent for this mission.

“Good. You will take care of the younger vampires. When it’s over, we will plant the cues: scent from the members of the protester’s group, execution style mutilation: spike in the heart, Cristian cross over their forehead, maybe a severed head or two.” He lists all the traditional executions and symbolisms of vampirism.

“I will have everything ready by tomorrow, the police will be sent on them by the next morning.” Mr. Wright says. Yakov nods and continues.

“We will strike at 0330, when they least expect us and when the guards tire out. Get in Romania by jets, we land in the countryside, use jeeps and unidentified vans to get to the safehouse in Bucharest's suburbs. Get to the building with civilian car, keep one escape van ready behind in case it goes wrong, but otherwise we will take the civilian vehicles back to the safehouse to keep it as unsuspicious as possible. The first team will go out an hour before the operation start to play their cover in the nearby street.” He finishes and clasp his hands behind his back. Karpov gives him a satisfied nod –as close to a positive reward as he’ll ever get- but he can feel the male human rolls his eyes.

“How do we know he’ll get it done? Because as far as I know, that’s just an agent you’re giving us here, nothing special.”

“Are you having distrust in Hydra? Senator Philips?” Karpov slowly asks him with a clear disdain in the voice.

“I may be the only human in this room, but that doesn’t mean I'm dumb. There’s a lot of important matters going on in Romania, we can’t afford to fuck it up, so yeah, I'm kind of distrustful of your fantastic plan right now.” The senator argues.

“You’ve seen the Winter Soldier’s record.” The vampire male, Mr. Wright sighs.

“I’ve never seen the White Wolf.”

“You don’t want to.” Yakov throws his eyes on the male human and bare his teeth before he can stop himself. He knows he's fucked up by the look on Karpov’s face, but he already went too far to stop right now, any rational thoughts be damned. “The White Wolf isn’t to be shown. It isn’t to be seen, to be remembered.” When he realizes he closed his fists and pushed himself on the tip of his toes, he forces himself to stand down. “The White Wolf is there to serve Hydra and Hydra only.” He adds, and the male has taken four steps back and pushed his hand to his belt where there’s a gun concealed. As if it would stop him.

“_Stand down!_” He’s ordered from Karpov in crud Russian.

All he receives as a warning is a shift in Karpov’s stance before a violent slap hit his face and throw his head down. It doesn’t hurt his body as much as it bruises his ego. He's the White Wolf, he’s the Winter Soldier, he’s the one called to be nothing but a ghost; and here he is, standing at attention and passive as he’s being slapped like a young child. He slowly turns his head back to Karpov but carefully keep his face neutral of any emotions.

He knows it’s a power move for Karpov, an assurance of his dominance over him, over the other present in the room. He can slap the great Winter Soldier and not get a scratch in return. See the power in his hands, be fearful. Yakov swallows his spits back and forces himself to calm down. The moon is tugging under his ribs, his Instinct itch inside his heart and all he can do is stand straight, motionless.

“_You speak, when you are told to speak, Soldat._” Karpov spits at him, still in Russian. “_Or have you forgotten where your place is_ Bucky, _again?_” He’s fixing unyielding eyes on him, full of anger and dominance. The name feels like a punch in his mind, like a bucket of ice-cold water being dumped over him, it’s a hand squeezing his throat while he tries to grab at it, to understand it. He has no idea what it means, who it belongs to, and yet it conjures a vivid feeling of anguish, of pain and cold and loneliness and nothingness. A feeling he never wants to experience ever again.

There’s a tone under Karpov’s voice that makes Yakov’s skin crawl, and before he can comprehend the flashes of pain and red in his vision, Karpov has looked away. Yakov is left gasping for air, blinded by the neon that light the room and a ringing in his ears.

He’s vaguely registering Karpov’s English to the others, telling them to expect the best results, and to Agent Ciobanu his go ahead for the mission. He listens as footsteps leave the room. He’s left with Karpov and three operatives that are paying more attention to the pair of them than they should. He forces his eyes on his superior’s face when he steps closer.

“_One more step out of the line, and you’ll be sorry for months. And I’ll make sure you remember it all this time._” He hisses through his teeth. Yakov’s brain is clouded by confusion and a feeling he’s not able to place but that tugs at his stomach and squeeze his lungs. He wants to say something but the air is not leaving his lungs.

“_Your plane to Romania takes off in thirty minutes._” Karpov continues as if nothing happened. “_Gear up, cover the wolf, and prepare the weapons you’ll want to take._” He tells him as he straightens his uniform wrinkled from the slap he gave him. “_Do not be late._” He adds for good measure; Yakov itches to tells him he’s never late, that he always does as he’s told, that he’s the best soldier they have. But if his Instinct wasn’t already screaming at him to run far from this place, his throat wouldn’t find the strength to say those words.

“_Yes sir._” He manages to squeeze out, and Karpov walks past him out of the room. He looks down at his hands, and they’re shaking. He tightens them into fists to stop the tremors and tentatively tries to breath the thoughts out of his mind the way he does before taking a shot from his sniper’s nest. It takes him six whole minutes before he can stumble out of the room to the armory.


End file.
